POLL-Florida bingo set will go for safest net-but whose?

June 08, 2012|Reuters

Including cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits? No,thatâ's not what Bontrager, 68, has in mind. "âIt is veryirritating when they say these are âentitlements,"ââ hecomplained. â"How can something be an entitlement when you'âvepaid for it your whole life?"

DEFICITS AHEAD

In fact, American workers and retirees are not paying enoughfor either Social Security or Medicare to remain solvent.

Obama and Romney agree that the programs must be changed,but they differ sharply on how to do it.

With 78 million baby boomers entering retirement, SocialSecurity is set to run short of money by 2037, according togovernment actuaries. The projected deficit: roughly $87 billion a year.

Romney favors a plan, popular in the business community, topartly privatize Social Security by directing the contributionsof future retirees into 401(k)-type investment accounts. Obamaopposes the idea, saying it would subject retirement savings âtothe whims of the stock market.â In the Reuters/Ipsos poll,seniors disagreed with the idea by 46 percent to 25 percent.

Romney would also raise the retirement age for full SocialSecurity benefits beyond 67 and would gradually boost theeligibility age for Medicare until it matches life expectancy.These "commonsense reforms," he says, would help "save SocialSecurity and Medicare for future generations."

Obama has backed away from proposals to postpone benefits,which would be unpopular among blue-collar voters with arduousjobs.

Instead, Obama, along with many Democrats, would replenishSocial Security by lifting the current cap on the payroll tax,so that income above $110,100 a year would no longer be exempt.

THE 'MEDISCARE' STAMPEDE

Lifting the cap is anathema to Republicans who vow not toraise taxes, but it taps into a growing public sentiment thatthe rich are not paying their fair share.

â"They need to change the tax structure,"â said JeanneCross, 82, a former receptionist who votes Republican. â"Allthese people making all this money, they'âre not paying as muchtaxes as you and I."â

Bontrager, the Tea Party sympathizer, disagrees. He onceowned an Indiana factory that made truck bodies and employed 135people. âThe âtax-the-richâ rhetoric is foolhardy,â he said.â"Have you ever seen a poor man create a job?"â

In 2008, 16 percent of voters were over 65, but two yearslater that proportion had jumped by five points. The power ofwhat pundits called âMediscareâ helped the GOP recapture controlof the House and gain six seats in the Senate.

In the next decade, spending for the giant insurance programis set to nearly double, from $576 billion to $1.05 trillion ayear, because of the rising cost of medical care and the agingof the population. By 2030 the number of Americans on Medicarewill jump from 49 million to 79 million.

A TV spot launched in Florida and other swing states lastmonth shows a young Obama with his grandparents and touts hisadministration's recovery of $4 billion from âhealthcare scamartists who prey on seniors.â